“Now again, Harrowby, you are falling into the inveterate race-delusion that man is intended to get somewhere. I do not see that the notion rests on any readily apparent basis. It is at any rate a working hypothesis that in the world-romance man, being cast for the part of fool, quite obviously best furthers the dénouement’s success by wearing his motley bravely.... There was a fool in my own romance, a character of no great importance; yet it was an essential incident in the story that he should irresponsibly mislay the King’s letter, and Sir Guiron thus be forced to seek service under Duke Florestan. Perhaps, in similar fashion, it is here necessary to the Author’s scheme that man must simply go on striving to gain a little money, food, and sleep, a trinket or two, some moments of laughter, and at the last a decent bed to die in. For it may well be that man’s allotted part calls for just these actions, to round out the drama artistically. Yes; it is quite conceivable that, much as I shaped events at Storisende, so here the Author aims toward making an æsthetic masterpiece of His puppet-play as a whole, rather than at ending everything with a transformation scene such as, when we were younger, used so satisfactorily to close _The Black Crook_ and _The Devil’s Auction_. For it may well be that the Author has, after all, more in common with Æschylus, say, than with Mr. Charles H. Yale.... So I must train my mind to be contented with appearances, whether they be true or not—and reserving always a permissible preference for pleasant delusions. Being mortal, I am able to contrive no thriftier bargain.”